News

Salman Asif joins us after a brief stop at Samsung Research in Dallas. Prior to that he was at Georgia Tech, where he received his PhD under the supervision of Justin Romberg, which makes him a 3rd (?) generation member of the Rice DSP group. His PhD work focused on compressive sensing, fast algorithms for dynamic updating of L1 problems, and recovery algorithms for streaming signals and videos. His current focus is on different aspects of compressive sensing, computational and medical imaging, and machine learning. He looks forward to new challenges and adventures at Rice!

Salman joined the DSP group in February, 2013.

Photo: Salman with a potential next generation DSPer, Noraiz, in Portland.

Broadcom is pleased to announce that Rohit Gaikwad has been named a 2013 Broadcom Fellow. Each year Broadcom awards certain individuals who have distinguished themselves as leaders and innovators, and who stand out even within the exceptional technical environment of Broadcom. The title of Broadcom Fellow is the highest honor the company bestows upon a very limited number of its most talented engineers. Rohit was selected because his tremendous accomplishments have contributed to the technical legacy and overall success of Broadcom.

Ankit Patel comes to us after spending 4 years as a high-frequency trader in Chicago. He has a PhD in Applied Mathematics from Harvard and his thesis focused on biologically-inspired computing and Markov models of sheets of dividing cells. His current focus is in the intersection between Machine Learning and Computational Neuroscience. He loves intellectual debate, tennis, and basketball (no, he does not play polo). Most of all, he looks forward to new challenges and adventures here at Rice! Ankit joined the DSP group in July, 2013.

Eric has returned to Duncan Hall, having completing his PhD in statistics at Rice in 2011.
Prior to joining the DSP group, he was a postdoc in the UCLA human genetics department where he developed machine learning algorithms for analyzing high throughput bioinformatics and biomedical imaging data.
Eric joined the DSP group in in July 3013.

The 2013 Ralph Budd Thesis Award goes to Chinmay Hegde, who graduated from Rice with a master’s degree in 2010 and a Ph.D. in 2012, both in electrical and computer engineering. His thesis was titled “Nonlinear Signal Models: Geometry, Algorithms, and Analysis.” The annual award is named for Ralph Budd, the Rice commencement speaker in 1935, who asked that his honorarium be used to benefit Rice students. Chinmay is a post-doctoral associate in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Mark Davenport (PhD 2011) will start at Georgia Tech the ECE Department in Fall 2012. Mark earned the Ralph Budd Thesis Award for the best thesis in the George R. Brown School of Engineering in 2011 and postdoc'ed with Emmanuel Candes at Stanford University. Mark joins Rice PhD alums Justin Romberg, Chris Rozell, James McClellan, Douglas Williams, and Rob Butera.

Arian Maleki (postdoc 2010-2012) will start at Columbia University in the Statistics Department in January 2013. He received his PhD in electrical engineering from Stanford University under the supervision of Houston native David Donoho in 2010.